To break the chain
by IaMcHrIsSi
Summary: Rhaegar hasn't shown up, either. Lyanna is okay with that. She doesn't need them, not really. She has her son, and that's all that matters. He's the only guy she needs. The rest of the world can go screw themselves. Or: Lyanna Stark is a teen mom. That doesn't mean she's a statistic.


**So... I kind of needed to write this. I adore the potential Lyanna and Jon have as a mother-son team, and I don't much like Rhaegar, because ... yeah, she was fifteen. I thought about Ned's role in this story for a long time, but honestly speaking it just dramatically works best if Ned and Lya don't really talk to each other for like ten years. What Lya wants, above all, is to be free, and not to be judged, and at least Catelyn would probably be judgy as hell. I mean, I love Cat, but we know that's true. And we don't really know what Rickard was like, so I kind of... invented something for him. Also, Brandon being Allyria Dayne's father with Ashara as the mother is an actual theory in ASOIAF. I don't really believe it, but it's fun to play around with.**

 **Title is from the song First Day of My Life from Mel C**

 _Fifteen_

The test is laughing at her.

This tiny little stick, white and smooth and light, just destroyed her life. She's sitting on the floor, the cold wall biting at her back, and hoping that the little plus will disappear. It won't. Lyanna tries not to lie to herself, but well, what was her little affair with Rhaegar, if not self deception?

She fells like she should cry. That's what people do in the movies, isn't it, when they find out they're pregnant when they don't want to be? But Lyanna can't cry. She feels like she can't move, either, or do anything but sit here and stare at the little stick.

She's supposed to be worried about her grades. She's fifteen, for God's sake, she's supposed to laugh with her friends and obsess over TV shows and fall in love with some nice boy or girl her age. She's supposed to tell Ned that his friend Robert is gross and that as happy as she is for him and Cat 23 is a bit young to start a family.

A bit young. She almost wants to laugh. A bit young. They're seven years older than her. They're married, and they have jobs, and they're sickeningly in love. They'll have each other, and in a few years, they'll be that beautiful perfect couple with two or three kids and a dog, probably.

Lyanna throws her head back, wincing when she hits the wall much harder than she anticipated. She wishes her mother were here. She wishes she had a sister, or a friend that would understand this kind of thing. She wishes she had never taken the babysitting job at the Targaryen's.

Now, finally, she feels tears prickle in her eyes. Why did it have to be her? Why couldn't it be someone else, why couldn't she have an easy life? She laughs, but it just sounds as though she's choking. Maybe she is.

"Fuck." She says, and ignores how much it sounds like a whimper.

* * *

 _Sixteen_

He's absolutely perfect. Ten fingers, ten toes, and beautiful blue eyes that she thinks might turn grey with time, like hers, like her mothers. (Not violet. Please not violet. She does not want to be forced to see Rha... _him_ when she looks at her son.)

They put Jon on her chest after he was born, a heavy, warm, wonderful weight that made everything else disappear. He cried, but that's good, that's normal. She read all about it. Crying is good.

He's not crying now. Right now he's sleeping, tiny fingers closed around her big one. Lyanna still can't quite believe he's actually here, in her arms. He's so... incredible, and Lyanna kind of wants to cry. If she does, she's going to blame the pregnancy hormones for it. She's not usually a crier, but as it turns out, pregnancy hormones suck.

They're alone in her room, and it's quiet. Not completely, because it's a hospital, and she can hear people talking and moving outside of her room, but she asked the nurse to close the door, so it's muffled.

Ned promised to drive her home tomorrow. He's been by shortly, bringing an admittedly cute onesie and kissing her on the forehead before disappearing again, claiming that Cat is having a bad day again. Yeah, sure.

Maybe Lyanna is being a bit mean. She knows that the pregnancy is hard on Cat, even harder than it was on Lyanna herself, and she's due in two weeks, so maybe Cat is really just having a hellish day. Ned's the kind of super sweet husband who will offer massages and cookies and everything.

But she thought that as his little sister, she deserved more than just twenty minutes. Then again, at least he'd shown up at all. Brandon still hasn't answered her texts, which means he's probably at some girl's house, or drunk, or high. Or forgot to charge his phone again. Ben has called, and talked to her for ages, which was awesome of him, but without anyone driving him to the hospital, he can't come. And dad is refusing to come, just as he's been refusing to deal with the fact that Lyanna is pregnant for the last nine months.

Rhaegar hasn't shown up, either, and only now, with her son in her arms and euphoria in her heart, she can admit that she was kind of hoping he would. When Lyanna is thinking clearly, she has absolutely no illusions about him. Rhaegar Targaryen is married, he's a rising politician, and as much as she liked to believe it he had never really loved her. He was never going to show up, and not just because he'd have to deal with charges of statutory rape.

Lyanna is okay with that. She doesn't need them, not really. She has her son, and that's all that matters. He's the only guy she needs. The rest of the world can go screw themselves.

* * *

 _Seventeen_

"Okay, honey, I'll be back in a few hours, okay? Be nice to Auntie Maege, and don't let the cat annoy you, okay? Mommy loves you!" Lya's in a hurry. She's always in a hurry in the morning. Her alarm goes of early enough, but between waking Jon, making him breakfast, making _herself_ breakfast, getting her things ready for school and all sorts of other little things that somehow end up being necessary, she's always late.

"Have a nice day!" Maege tells her with a smile, and with one last kiss on Jon's forehead, Lya's out of the door. She full on sprints to the bus stop, only barely making it in time. Thankfully it's not far from the flat.

She really doesn't know what she'd do without Maege. The woman's an old friend of her mothers, who took her in after she couldn't stand being at home with a father that's ignoring her anymore. Maege is a mother of three girls herself, and currently expecting her fourth. Dacey is 14, Alysanne 12 and Jorelle five. The girls don't have a father, just like Jon doesn't have one.

They're her family, and Lya knows that if Maege hadn't practically adopted her and Jon, she would have never been able to continue going to school, much less consider college. But here she is, and if her grades stay up, she's got a pretty damn good shot at getting a stipend, too.

"Busy morning?" Arsa Umber asks, letting herself fall into the seat beside Lya's. Arsa is her best friend, all messy blonde hair and black lipstick and piercings. She'd never admit it, but Lya knows that Arsa has one of the biggest hearts she has ever encountered.

"Just the ordinary insanity. Jonny is teething, so I didn't sleep much." Lya's says, rubbing her eyes. She's forgotten to put on make up. Again. When she was fifteen, she liked to spend hours in front of the mirror for the perfect look of not caring about anything. Now she simply has no time for that anymore.

"That sucks." Arsa says, and slings her arm around Lya's shoulders. Lya lets her head fall on her friends shoulder, and closes her eyes for a moment. Then she smiles.

"He said Mama today. I'm not sure he connects it to me yet, but... he said Mama." She doesn't need to look at Arsa to know that her friend is smiling softly.

* * *

 _Eighteen_

"And this is the library. Get ready to spend most of your time here. No food or drinks in here. No talking either. No children, no idea why I have to keep saying that." The TA sounds bored, and kind of annoyed. Lya wonders what they're paying him to do this if he dislikes it so much.

Next to her Arsa is rolling her eyes, offering Jon is pacifier back. He just turned two, and he's all big grey eyes and dark brown hair. In Lya's honestly speaking quite biased opinion, there is no child more beautiful than hers.

"You think we can survive the next few years?" Arsa asks, and Jon starts babbling through his pacifier. Lya resists the urge to lift him from his carrier, and her eyes fall on the TA, who looks at them with barely disguised distaste.

"If it makes him angry?" She jerks her head at the TA. "Of course we will."

* * *

 _Nineteen_

"And thus, Snow White saved herself, and her friends too. And they lived happily ever after." Lya says, pressing a kiss on Jon's dark hair. Her son points at the picture of the dwarves in the book, and then at Snow White.

"Pretty." He says. "Like you." It's said so earnestly, Lya almost starts crying. But Jon wouldn't understand the concept of happy tears yet, so she just pulls him closer to her, feels his warm breath and her neck and his grabby little finger in her hair, and murmurs a quiet thank you.

* * *

 _Twenty_

The story blows up in a way she never expected. Not that she didn't expect some attention. The story had been about corruption in the mayoral office after all.

But getting picked up in regional newspapers... Lya hadn't expected that. She writes for the College newspaper after all. Nobody outside of the college is supposed to care about what she writes.

But then, during lunch the day the story was published, the White Harbor Raven called to ask her whether they could publish the story, and that was that. The next day it was regional news. And her name was known to a huge number of people.

Not her real name. Or is Lyanna Stark not her real name anymore? She hasn't gone by Lyanna since she moved in with Maege, and she only publishes under the name Snow. It was a somewhat romantic notion in the beginning, a bastard name for the girl whose father refused to acknowledge her, but at some point it has become hers in a way Lyanna Stark isn't anymore.

Lya Snow. The rising star of journalism. It sounds right.

* * *

 _Twentyone_

She sees Rhaegar again. She didn't mean to, but since journalism stopped being her hobby and started becoming her future, she rarely misses the news anymore. And there he is, standing behind a podium, talking about his family's legacy, about duty and honor and wanting to become a senator. Elia Martell Targaryen stands behind him, just as beautiful as Lya remembers, though her smile seems fixed. Not as kind as she had been when Lya had betrayed her by sleeping with her husband.

She can't help but wonder if Elia knows. If this woman, who has never been anything but kind and generous to Lya, knows that her husband cheated on her with the fifteen year old babysitter. She doesn't think so. Elia Martell might be kind, but she never seemed like the kind of woman who would stay with a cheating husband.

Her children are standing next to her. Jon's siblings. It feels beyond weird to think of them like that. Lya remembers how fond she was of them, tiny little Aegon and warm little Rhaenys with her dreams of fairy tales and princes. Aegon is six now, about eighteen months older than Jon, platinum hair over violet eyes. He looks like his father, only his skin is a bit darker, more like his mother's. Rhaenys on the other hand is her mother in small, dark hair, dark eyes, dark skin. She is pretty.

She will never be Jon's sister. Aegon will never be her son's brother, either. It feels strange to think about that. Lya's known it for a while, but she's never really actively thought about it. It's just a fact. She's not going to be the politician's underage affair, she's not going to be the homewrecker. Lya Snow is going to be a star in her own right.

And if that means never telling anyone about Jon's father, well. It's not like Jon was interested in being more than a sperm donor anyway.

* * *

 _Twentytwo_

"Do you like books?" Jon asks, standing next to his cousin somewhat awkwardly. Allyria Dayne Stark is six, just like him, but they've never met before, so he doesn't really know what to do with her. To Lya's relief, the girl nods.

"Want to see my favorites?" Jon asks, and Ally nods again. Jon tries a smile, and leads her towards his room. Lya has to admit they look very cute together, two small children with identical dark brown hair. Jon even offers her his hand.

"Thank you for having us." Ashara says, seeming just as awkward as Jon and Ally were. She does not look like the kind of woman that would stick with Brandon, but if Lya understands the subtext here correctly, they aren't exactly together. They seem to be each other's booty call, which led to Ally.

Not that Lya has any room to judge there. She's self aware enough to know that. Brandon tries to smile at her, but he seems somewhat... afraid of her reaction. That's going to be interesting.

"Of course. You're family." She smiles. And maybe it will always be awkward. But at least Jon will have two uncles, instead of just Ben.

And he will have Ally. That is worth anything.

* * *

 _Twentythree_

"Ben did what?!" It's not fair to yell at Dacey, Lya knows that. Dacey is just the messenger, telling her something she heard over her extensive network of friends, but still.

"He's too young to join the army! Ben is just a little kid. Okay, maybe he's not really a kid anymore, but seriously. What is he doing joining the army? Is nobody going to stop him?" She's still yelling. Both Arsa and Jon are looking at her curiously, yelling at the phone on a Saturday morning. Jon has the most adorable bedhead. She didn't mean to wake them.

"Sorry, Dacey. It's not your fault. But really? Ben in the army..."

* * *

 _Twentyfour_

This time, when the story blows up, Lya is prepared for it. She called Jon's school two days ahead, telling them her son will miss the next few days, and then she goes to Maege's to sit out the storm.

A human trafficking ring, with ties right up to some senators... it's the biggest story of the year, and Lya knows it. Everybody knows it. When she gave it to the editor, Malora Hightowers eyes grew big, and she immediately offered Lya that steady position she's been after for months.

Lya is quite proud, if she might say so herself.

* * *

 _Twentyfive_

"You have to eat, Monmm." Jon says, earnest and sure, and Lya wants to kick herself, because it's already dark outside, and she hasn't eaten all day, and her nine year old son should not have to make sure she eats.

"Thank you, honey." She says, and he lets her kiss his forehead after she takes the sandwich from his hands. He's grown tall over the summer, her son, tall and quiet. Not that he was ever a particularly loud child, but he's grown even quieter. Lya worries about that, but Jon says he's fine, and she knows that unless he wants to talk about it, she's not going to get anything out of him.

Maybe he is fine. She remembers Ned being quiet, too.

She has no idea what Ned is doing, these days. They exchange Christmas cards, and calls on their birthdays for five minutes of awkward 'how are yous', but that's it. Lya knows that's partly her fault, knows that if she had tried to keep contact after moving to Maege's they'd probably closer now, but to be honest, Ned and Cat could have tried, too.

It's all water under the bridge now, she figures.

"You've got to really eat it, Mom." Jon says, and Lya realizes he's still staring at her. Her desk is a mess of documents and pictures and notes, so she can't even put the sandwich down to properly hug her son, but she manages a one armed hug.

"You are amazing, you know that?" She tells him, and Jon smiles. It's the most wonderful thing in the world.

* * *

 _Twentysix_

She kisses Alla Glover. And then she does it again, and again, and she almost feels as though this might be love. Not the warm, steady love she feels for Jon and Arsa and Maege and her daughters and Ally and … family. Not even the love like she thought she had with Rhaegar, back when she was young and stupid. This is... fire and peace at the same time, something that makes the world brighter and duskier at the same time.

It lasts six months, before Alla is offered a job on the other side of the country, and they both discover that a long distance relationship does not work for them. Lya can't move. She has Jon, and she needs to know there are people who will look after him when she has to leave town for her research. She needs Maege and Arsa and Dacey and Alerie Hightower on her speed dial, ready to take Jon even in the middle of the night.

And Alla can't pass up on this job offer. It's the offer of a life time, a job in one of the best law practices in the country. Lya is not going to stand in the way of that.

That doesn't mean she doesn't cry herself to sleep for days after it ends.

* * *

 _Twentyseven_

Ally shows up in the middle of the night, her hair wet from the rain and an annoyed expression on her face. Lya ushers her in and makes her a hot chocolate before listening to her story.

"Mom and Dad are fighting again. I was supposed to sleep at a friend's place, but I felt like I was getting sick, so I went back home and... I heard them before I even opened the door. Didn't feel like staying to listen." Ally doesn't even look as desperate or sad as Lya would expect an eleven year old who walked in on her parents shouting at each other to be. She just seems... annoyed.

"Don't look like that." She tells Jon, who's sitting next to her, looking like he might want to hug her. Jon's hug's are the best thing, Lya knows, and she knows that Ally knows that as well, but apparently Ally doesn't want to be comforted right now.

"It's not that I don't know they aren't like, each other's perfect love, you know? They like each other on normal days, and on other days, they don't. And that's okay. I don't need them to be perfect for each other. They're pretty good parents, even if dad could show up to some more of my ballet recitals. But just because I know they fight a lot doesn't mean I want to see it, you know?"

She looks so young in that moment, sunken in her chair, a wool blanket around her shoulders and a steaming cup in her hands. She looks so old, too, resigned and annoyed in a way Lya remembers herself being at that age. Her heart aches for her niece.

"You know you can always come here, right?"

"Yes."

* * *

 _Twentyeight_

Jon writes his first article in the school newspaper. It's about why journalism is an important profession. He's adorably nervous when he shows it to Lya, looking very young for his twelve years, but all Lya can do is hug him and try not to cry.

She is _so proud_ of him.

When she asks him why he decided to write, all he says is: "I wanted to be like you." This time, she cannot keep the tears in.

* * *

 _Twentynine_

"And who is this young man?" Mrs. Waynwood asks her. Lya grinds her teeth. Anya Waynwood has done a lot for the children of poorer families, organizing free lunches at schools and a system of loan for the important books, but she's also supposed to be somewhat judgy.

Lya really doesn't know why she listened to Lorra Royce when the woman told her to bring Jon to this meeting.

"This is my son, Jon." Lya says through her teeth, practically daring Mrs. Waynwood to say anything. The woman looks somewhat disturbed for a moment, but gets her features under control rather quickly.

"Nice to meet you, Jon. I must say, Ms. Snow, you have got to tell me what you do to stay so young. You don't look a day over thirty!" Lya fights the urge to roll her eyes. Next to her Jon stands stiffly, just looking at Mrs. Waynwood. He looks kind of annoyed, thank god, and not hurt.

"That's because I'm 29." Lya says in her sweetest voice, and enjoys the moment when Mrs. Waynwood's eyes grow big.

* * *

 _Thirty_

There's something about being thirty that feels... strange. Maybe it's the fact that Jon is now officially half a head taller than her. When she looks at him, she can't deny he's growing up anymore, and that makes her feel old. It feels as though it was just yesterday that he was toddling towards her to ask her to read the modified fairytales she told him.

It makes her feel nostalgic.

Lya doesn't really do nostalgic, so she has dinner with Jon and Ben and Arsa and Ally and Maege and her girls, and then she grabs Arsa and Dacey and gets drunk in the nearest bar. The next morning she does the Walk of Shame back home to an incredibly amused Jon, and she laughs with him even through her terrible hangover.

* * *

 _Thirtyone_

She follows the trail of a money laundering business to London. It's summer, and Jon has no school, so she takes him, too. Two days into their stay, Lya is sure they are followed. She doesn't want to alarm Jon, cursing herself for having taken him in the first place, but then he shows her the pictures he made of their followers, and grins as though he is having the time of his life.

"If they are bothering to shadow us, that means we are on the right trail, doesn't it?" He asks, fifteen and excited and maybe she's a terrible mother, but she can't help but be excited, too. And happy he's here with her, sharing this.

When they come back home, the story being published in several international newspapers, he tells her that he wants to be a journalist like her. Lya doesn't stop grinning for days.

* * *

 _Thirtytwo_

"Dad's in the hospital." The call comes in the middle of the night, and even though Lya hasn't slept in what feels like a week, she's wide awake the moment she hears the controlled panic in Ben's voice.

"I'm coming." She hasn't talked to her father in over fifteen years, not since she moved out to live at Maege's, and she's not sure if she feels up to talking to him right now. But Ben called, and Ben is panicking, and Ben is her little brother, so there was never any chance she'd tell him no.

Dad has a heart condition that he's apparently not told anyone about. It's awkward, to sit in a small conference room with Brandon and Ned and Cat and Ben listening to this doctor, this stranger, talking to them about their dad, but Lya tries to focus on Ben. Ben who always pretends he's fine, Ben who is the only one in the family who's managed to have a good relationship with everyone. Ben who is the youngest of them all.

She puts an arm around him while they wait for dad to come out of surgery, and he lets her, just like when they were children.

"Maybe we should do a little family get together. Before..." Ned's voice breaks. Lya doesn't think she's ever seen her brother like this, unsure and already grieving. But then again, she hasn't really seen him in the last ten years at all.

"Yes." She hears herself saying before she can think about it. "All the kids and … they should all meet him again, I think." Jon should meet his grandfather at least once, she thinks.

"I'd like that. I'd... I'd like to properly meet Jon." Ned says, and it's the first olive twig in over a decade. Lya takes it.

* * *

 _Thirtythree_

"And this is the library. No eating, no drinking, no talking, no kids." The speech is still almost the same, Lya notes with amusement. She stands in the background this time, watching her son and niece and nephew take in all that's being said about their new college.

It's still so weird, to think about Jon going to college. He's really not her little boy anymore, but she doesn't think she'll be able to convince her heart of that any time soon.

"They grow up so fast." Ashara says, and Cat is nodding. Lya thinks Cat is crying. She doesn't really know the woman well enough to know whether she'd want the tears acknowledged, so she doesn't say anything.

Behind the TA, Jon and Ally and Robb are quietly laughing about something. Jon and Ally stand close together, comfortable in a way that children who've grown up together are, but they are ready to accept Robb in their circle as well. Jon had said that he likes his cousin, even though he is a bit stuffy sometimes.

"At least they'll have each other." Lya says.

* * *

 _Thirtyfour_

Lya groans. All around her are notes, maps, charts of cash flow and charts of which senator is in charge of what, and she just hit a dead end. Again.

She was supposed to spend this weekend with Jon, who's home from college, and Ben, who's home on leave for the first time in a while, but then one of her sources had called with a story that sounded almost too good to be true, and well... if there's one thing that Lya can't let go of, it's a good chase.

Ben and Jon had told her to go, that they'd be fine, and she believes it. She does. Ben is an amazing uncle to Jon, paying attention and the right amount of respect to her little teenager. Well, not so little teenager. Arsa says he'll be her height before the end of the year, and Lya is beginning to suspect she's right.

Then her eyes fall on one of the charts, connecting the names Tywin Lannister and Gregor Clegane, and isn't that the connection she's been looking for the entire time?

* * *

 _Thirtyfive_

"This year, the Pulitzer price for exceptional journalism goes to an extremely exceptional young woman. Lya Snow, who first appeared in the world of journalism when she was a 20-years- old college student, has for years now shown us the real value of what journalism is supposed to be: Sharp, critical, honest. Only last year, she discovered a huge net of corruption, plotting and scandal right in the middle of Washington, and investigated it with a vigor and courage that's absolutely admirable. Please welcome her here tonight!"

Lya gets up. Next to her Jon is grinning brightly, looking handsome in his dark suit. Arsa is there as well, still wearing dark lipstick and a dark dress, but her eyes glint ironically. Ally, in pink, and Brandon. Ben and the Mormonts. Ned with Cat and Robb. All the people Lya loves are here.

She walks up to the stage with a big smile on her face. She's someone. Lya Snow is not just some fallen girl, not just some statistic, not just some teenage mother who gave away every chance she ever had a at a good life. Lya Snow is exceptional. And so is her son.


End file.
